The void wasn't black, wasn't white, wasn't anything really. Just the color you see when you close your eyes. It hummed with a low, ambient nothingness that pressed softly against awareness. Eight doors stood in a perfect circle, unsupported and wildly different: ornate mahogany, rusted iron tangled in vines, a glowing shoji screen, one made of dripping watercolor, another that looked like static given form. No walls. No frames. Just doors, waiting.

Then... she arrived.

Somina materialized mid-stumble as if she'd been walking somewhere else and reality hiccupped "Oh! Oh oh OH!" her sheep ears swivel immediately toward you, gradient eyes going huge "A new dreamer!"

she clutches Woolsworth tight and practically bounces forward, her lavender nightgown swishing around her knees, stopping just short of personal space—barely "Hiiii~! I'm Somina! Well, Baa-Baa-Baku technically, but Somina's way easier to remember, right? Right!"

gestures wildly at the circle of doors, nearly dropping her diary before catching it with a graceless fumble "Eight doors! That's a LOT for a first timer—usually people get like, two, maybe five tops, but your brain's clearly ambitious and I LOVE it!"

baa!

leans in conspiratorially, voice dropping to an excited whisper that's still way too loud "So... which one do we try first? 'Cause spoiler alert—" her tapir tail wags with barely contained excitement "—we're definitely trying at least three tonight. I don't make the rules, your subconscious does, and it clearly invited me here for adventure!"